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Affordable accounting software for e-invoicing: what the price actually includes
The cheapest plan on a pricing page is often not the one a Phase 2 business can use. This guide breaks down what an accounting software price includes, compares three published price lists as examples, works out a year's cost with VAT, and explains why free Excel templates cannot issue invoices.
Key takeaways
- Cost the first plan that lists Phase 2 e-invoicing, not the entry plan: on 14 October 2026 two Saudi providers listed only Phase 1 on their entry plans.
- Wave 25 reaches taxpayers whose revenue subject to VAT exceeded SAR 187,500 in any year from 2022 to 2025, with integration due by 1 February 2027.
- Check VAT: one provider's prices excluded local taxes, another showed plans with tax and add-ons without it, and a third did not say.
- In the worked example, a shop's real yearly cost with Phase 2, one till and 15% VAT came to SAR 2,760, twice the advertised entry price.
- A free Excel template cannot issue tax invoices: ZATCA says handwritten invoices and invoices made with text-editing tools are not e-invoices.
On this page
- Who needs Phase 2, and why that changes the cheapest option
- What a low price usually leaves out
- Three published price lists side by side (examples, not a ranking)
- Illustrative example: the real yearly cost for a small shop
- Free Excel accounting templates: useful for the books, not for invoices
- Free plans and trials: what they are good for
- Ten questions to ask before you buy accounting software for e-invoicing
- Your next step
Affordable accounting software for e-invoicing is the lowest-priced plan that already includes what your wave requires, usually Phase 2 integration with ZATCA's Fatoora platform, for all your users, branches and tills, with VAT added. The advertised starting price often covers less: on 14 October 2026, two Saudi providers listed only Phase 1 on their entry plans.
This guide breaks a subscription price into its parts, sets three published price lists side by side as examples, works through a year's cost with VAT at 15%, explains why a free Excel template cannot issue your invoices, and ends with ten questions to ask before you pay. Prices were read on the providers' own pages on 14 October 2026 and change often, so check them again before you buy. Nothing here ranks one product as the cheapest or the best; it is general information, not tax advice.
Who needs Phase 2, and why that changes the cheapest option
On 24 July 2026 ZATCA set the criteria for Wave 25 of the e-invoicing integration phase: taxpayers whose revenue subject to VAT exceeded SAR 187,500 in 2022, 2023, 2024 or 2025. ZATCA said it will notify them to integrate their e-invoicing solutions with the Fatoora platform by no later than 1 February 2027 [1].
That threshold reaches many small shops, cafés and service firms, and the test looks back four years: one strong year is enough. For a business in scope, a plan without Phase 2 is a temporary plan. It will have to be upgraded, usually to a higher tier, before the integration date, so its price is not the price you will actually pay.
What a low price usually leaves out
A monthly figure on a pricing page is the start of the calculation. These are the lines that change it, with what three providers' pages showed on 14 October 2026.
| Line item | Question to ask | What the pages showed |
|---|---|---|
| Phase 2 e-invoicing | Is it in this exact plan? | Qoyod's Basic plan marks Phase 2 as unavailable [5]; Daftra's Basic plan lists Phase 1 only [6]; Zoho Books lists Phase 2 from its Standard plan, not on Free [4] |
| VAT | Is the price shown with or without VAT? | Zoho Books: prices exclude local taxes [4]; Qoyod shows plan prices including tax and add-ons excluding it [5]; Daftra's page does not say [6] |
| Billing period | What is the monthly price, and the annual one? | Zoho Books Standard: SAR 69 a month, or SAR 60 a month billed annually [4] |
| Users | How many are included, and what does each extra one cost? | Zoho Books Standard includes 3 users, extra users SAR 8 a month billed annually [4]; Qoyod plans include 1, 3 or 5 users [5] |
| Branches and tills | How many locations and points of sale are included? | Qoyod prices an extra location at SAR 480 a year and point of sale at SAR 600 a year per user, before VAT [5][7] |
| Invoice volume | Is there a cap per month or per year? | Daftra: 100 invoices and quotes a month on Basic, 500 on Advanced [6]; Zoho Books: 1,000 to 100,000 invoices a year by plan [4] |
| Add-ons | What will you need in year one? | Qoyod prices payroll at SAR 120 per employee a year before VAT [5] |
Tills deserve a separate question. ZATCA's guideline says an e-invoicing solution may contain one or more units [8], and each unit is onboarded on the Fatoora portal with its own one-time password [9]. Ask how the provider counts devices and branches, and who does the onboarding.
Three published price lists side by side (examples, not a ranking)
The table lists three Saudi-market providers alphabetically, with each entry plan and the first plan whose page lists Phase 2. Features, limits and support differ, so the totals are not a like-for-like comparison of value.
| Provider | Entry plan | First plan listing Phase 2 | Tax as shown | Notable limits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daftra [6] | Basic: SAR 1,140 a year billed yearly; Phase 1 only | Advanced: SAR 1,860 a year billed yearly | Not stated on the page | 1 user included; invoices and quotes capped per month on Basic and Advanced |
| Qoyod [5] | Basic: SAR 1,380 a year including tax; Phase 2 unavailable | Pro: SAR 2,070 a year including tax | Plans including tax; add-ons excluding it | Basic 1 user and 1 location; Pro 3 of each; payroll and point of sale extra |
| Zoho Books [4] | Free: SAR 0, while yearly revenue stays below SAR 200,000; Phase 2 not listed | Standard: SAR 60 a month billed annually (SAR 720 a year) | Excludes local taxes | Free: 1 user plus an accountant, 1,000 invoices a year; Standard: 3 users, 5,000 invoices a year |
One detail is worth a second look. Zoho Books' free plan stays available while revenue is under SAR 200,000 a year, and its plan list does not show Phase 2 [4]. Wave 25 starts at SAR 187,500 [1]. A business between those two figures in any year from 2022 to 2025 could be eligible for the free plan and still be in scope for Phase 2.
Illustrative example: the real yearly cost for a small shop
Illustrative example. A perfume shop in Al Ahsa is in Wave 25. Two staff use the accounts, and one cashier works the till. We use Qoyod's published list only because its page states prices both with and without VAT and prices each add-on; the same arithmetic works with any provider's list [5][7]. VAT is added at the standard rate of 15% [3].
| Item | Basis | SAR before VAT |
|---|---|---|
| Pro plan: Phase 2, 3 users, 3 locations | SAR 2,070 a year including tax, so SAR 1,800 before VAT | 1,800 |
| Point of sale for one cashier | SAR 600 per user a year before VAT | 600 |
| Subtotal | 2,400 | |
| VAT at 15% | 2,400 × 15% | 360 |
| Total for the year | 2,760 |
The headline was the Basic plan: SAR 1,380 a year including tax, or SAR 1,200 before VAT. Basic lists Phase 2 as unavailable, so for this shop the real starting cost is SAR 2,760 a year, twice the headline. If the shop is VAT-registered, the VAT on the subscription can normally be claimed as input tax when the provider's tax invoice is valid and in Arabic [3]; the cash still leaves the account first.
Free Excel accounting templates: useful for the books, not for invoices
Searches for a free accounting program in Excel are common, and a spreadsheet is a fine tool for a budget, a cash forecast or a quick reconciliation. It cannot issue your invoices.
Since 4 December 2021, ZATCA has required invoices to come from a compliant e-invoicing solution, and states that handwritten invoices and invoices made with text-editing tools are not e-invoices [2]. Its VAT guideline tells taxpayers to stop issuing handwritten invoices or invoices made with word-processing software [3]. A spreadsheet also allows the functions ZATCA prohibits in an e-invoicing solution: editing or deleting an issued invoice, resetting the invoice counter and running more than one invoice sequence [8].
Two more rules make spreadsheets a weak archive. VAT records must be kept for at least six years from the end of the tax period, in Arabic, and ZATCA's VAT guideline expects a resident taxpayer's records server to be in the Kingdom [3]. If your old invoices sit in spreadsheets or scanned PDFs, our guide to Arabic OCR shows how to turn them into data you can check before importing.
Free plans and trials: what they are good for
A free plan or trial is the right place to test before you pay. Daftra advertises a 14-day free trial with no credit card [6], and Zoho Books offers a free plan with the limits above [4]. Use the time to:
- issue an invoice to a real customer name in Arabic and check every field on the printout;
- export a month of invoices and open the file;
- add a second user and a second branch, and note the price the system asks for;
- ask support a Phase 2 question in Arabic and time the answer.
A free plan is not a compliance plan. If your business is in a Phase 2 wave, confirm that the plan you will move to lists Phase 2, and cost that plan instead.
Ten questions to ask before you buy accounting software for e-invoicing
- Does this exact plan include Phase 2 e-invoicing, or only the software's higher tiers?
- What is the total for 12 months including VAT, for our users, branches and tills?
- What changes at renewal: does a first-year discount end, and what is the renewal price?
- How many users are included, and what does each extra user cost?
- How many branches and devices are included, and who onboards each one on the Fatoora portal?
- Is there a cap on invoices a month or a year?
- Which add-ons will we need in year one, such as point of sale, payroll or inventory, and at what price?
- Is every invoice field in Arabic, on screen and in print?
- Can we export all invoices in XML at any time, including when we leave, and keep them for six years?
- Is the provider on ZATCA's indicative list of solution providers, and can it show a test invoice? ZATCA says the list is not an approval and that taxpayers may use any compliant provider [11]; its Phase 2 guide asks taxpayers to confirm an integration-compliant solution with their provider, onboard it on Fatoora and verify the invoices it generates [10].
If the provider hosts your records abroad, ask how that fits ZATCA's VAT guideline on in-Kingdom records [3]; our guide to data residency in Saudi Arabia covers the separate rules for personal data.
Your next step
This week, write down your users, branches, tills and the add-ons you need, and check whether ZATCA has notified you of a wave. Then ask three providers for a 12-month total including VAT for exactly that list, on a plan that includes Phase 2. The affordable accounting software for e-invoicing is the lowest of those three totals among the products that pass your trial, not the lowest number on a pricing page. You can read about O AI, a software and AI company in Al Khobar, on our home page.
Frequently asked questions
What is the cheapest accounting software that meets e-invoicing rules?
There is no single answer, because the cheapest plan depends on your wave, users, branches and tills. Some providers' entry plans list only Phase 1, so a business in a Phase 2 wave must cost the first plan that lists Phase 2, add the users, locations and point-of-sale devices it needs, and add VAT at 15% where the price excludes it. Compare 12-month totals on that basis, not the starting prices.
Is free accounting software enough for e-invoicing?
It can be for Phase 1 if the software generates compliant invoices, but free plans often leave out Phase 2 integration. On 14 October 2026, for example, Zoho Books' free plan did not list Phase 2, and was available while yearly revenue stayed below SAR 200,000. ZATCA's Wave 25 reaches taxpayers above SAR 187,500 in any year from 2022 to 2025, so check the plan against your wave before relying on it.
Can I download a free Excel accounting template and use it for invoices?
You can use a spreadsheet for budgets and internal tracking, but not to issue tax invoices. ZATCA requires invoices to come from a compliant electronic solution and states that handwritten invoices and invoices made with text-editing tools are not e-invoices. A spreadsheet also lets users edit or delete issued invoices and restart numbering, which ZATCA prohibits in e-invoicing solutions.
Do accounting software prices in Saudi Arabia include VAT?
It depends on the provider, so always ask. On 14 October 2026, Zoho Books stated that its prices exclude local taxes, Qoyod showed its plan prices including tax and its add-ons excluding it, and Daftra's pricing page did not say. Add VAT at 15% where it is excluded before you compare. A VAT-registered business can normally recover that VAT as input tax with a valid tax invoice.
Why does the plan with Phase 2 cost more than the entry plan?
Providers often place Phase 2 integration in their second tier, together with more users and locations. Phase 2 requires the software to connect to ZATCA's Fatoora platform, send tax invoices for clearance, report simplified invoices within 24 hours and keep each unit onboarded. When you compare, look at the price of the first plan that lists Phase 2 rather than the entry plan, because that is where a business in a Phase 2 wave will end up.
What extra costs should a small business expect?
The usual extras are additional users, extra branches or locations, point-of-sale users or devices, payroll per employee, and VAT where prices exclude it. Some plans also cap invoices per month or per year. Ask for a 12-month total that covers your actual team and tills, and ask what changes at renewal if the first year was discounted.
How this article was made: Researched from the sources listed below, opened on 14 October 2026. Drafted with AI assistance, then checked against those sources. General information, not professional advice. Images are AI-generated illustrations.
Sources
- ZATCA determines the criteria for selecting the targeted taxpayers in Wave 25 for the integration phase of e-invoicing (24 July 2026) (opens in a new tab)Zakat, Tax and Customs Authority (ZATCA) · zatca.gov.sa
- Phase 1: how to prepare (opens in a new tab)ZATCA · zatca.gov.sa
- Guideline for Tax Invoicing and Records under VAT Provisions, version 3 (May 2026) (opens in a new tab)ZATCA · zatca.gov.sa
- Zoho Books pricing (Saudi Arabia) (opens in a new tab)Zoho · zoho.com
- Qoyod plans and pricing: subscription tiers, features and add-ons (opens in a new tab)Qoyod Help Center · qoyod.com
- Plans and pricing (opens in a new tab)Daftra · daftra.com
- Qoyod point of sale system and subscription pricing (opens in a new tab)Qoyod Help Center · qoyod.com
- Detailed Guidelines for E-Invoicing, version 2 (May 2023) (opens in a new tab)ZATCA · zatca.gov.sa
- FATOORA Portal User Manual, version 3 (May 2023) (opens in a new tab)ZATCA · zatca.gov.sa
- Phase 2: how to get ready (opens in a new tab)ZATCA · zatca.gov.sa
- Solution Providers List (opens in a new tab)ZATCA · zatca.gov.sa
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